


Muriel Lives

by purplegrl



Series: Muriel [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-02
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2020-07-29 14:20:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20083630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplegrl/pseuds/purplegrl
Summary: In 1998, an unusual young woman lives in a tiny English Village in the hills & while slowly getting over the death of her mother and best friend encounters a truth about herself that should have stayed buried.





	1. I

I.  
There was a single magpie perched on the roof of the wooden porch as I stood leaning over the decking bannister at the front of the house. It had all begun to rot through so my sleeves were wet with moss and bits of damp splintered wood. The bird screeched and pulled at a chunk of its feathers. I continued to smoke but I had the distinct feeling it was watching me as it angrily pruned itself. I glared back at it intently before brushing off the thought.  
"Birds aren't interested in us." I silently shrugged to myself.  
Today was supposedly a relatively normal Tuesday afternoon. The sky was quite dark and the smell of burning diesel and pine lingered in the air and besides the angry sounding magpie above me, the only sound was the steady knock of the generator on the other side of the garden. Well, I say garden.  
Our house was basically situated within what was a cross between forest and scrub land and the 'garden' was filled with all manner of scrap cars, vans and motorbikes in various shapes of working and parts were plentiful. My older brother was a mechanic and scrap merchant and inherited the yard and house from our mother about 8 years prior. Our father built it and the entire yard around it but the only thing I really knew about him was that he was a drinker and he didn't have anywhere near the flare that my brother did for mechanics. He was called Alwyn Terrance Morpeth II as that was also our fathers name, so from henceforth Ill refer to him as we all did. Spett. At that time he was 30. Built like a lanky twig with a faded deep red mohawk that was unkept so his hair on the sides had grown back in his usual shade of dark brown. He had narrow green and grey eyes that always retained a cocky spark. He’d worn the same battered leather jacket since he was 15 and it had seen so much oil and grime I swore that’s what held it together. I was pretty sure it was both waterproof and sentient.  
Spett actually refused to talk about Alwyn and he'd died when my mother was pregnant and no body every really mentioned him. I suppose he’d occasionally be referenced when necessary but it was usually only briefly and was never in a kind nostalgic way. More matter of factly. You’d think I’d have asked about this but there was just something about the way they both referred to him that made me never want to pull at that thread.  
The sky suddenly rang with the sound of his gravely voice calling me over. The magpie stared at me again, shouted and took to the sky in annoyance. I considered ignoring him altogether and going back into the house just for something to do to break up the monotony of the day but something just rang entirely wrong for the day that I couldn't put my finger on. I threw the cigarette end into the yard and headed over to where he was working.   
Honestly what he wanted was so trivial I cannot for the life remember what it was any more but it doesn't matter. It did mean heading out of our little village of Sparrowpit and into the bigger town of New Mills. North West England was both a visionary gemstone and frightfully boring. I'd just spent a long time making mix tapes for the van anyway so I figured a small trip was needed as a tester. Again anything to relive the boredom. That was basically my life for the 8 years since my mum died. Anything to relive the boredom and block things out. I told Spett once again that the engine of the van was making an odd noise and he just laughed and mentioned a turbo lump. I'm convinced he gave it me to wind me up. It was a 1967 Bedford Rascal. Cream with rust highlights. He'd messed around with it so it was reasonably quick but it looked completely hideous. I told him this on numerous occasions in the past few years and was always met with laughter and the 'its a free van' comment but it was OK for him, he had full pick of the yard. The swine.

It was late afternoon by the time I pulled up in the main street outside where I worked since I’d gone the long way around. I just sat in the van for a few minutes considering what order to do the bullshit errands in as I also had a floristry job but it wasn’t exactly a rush order. Suppose it would have given me something to do but as I looked out of the window any thoughts followed and whatever breath I had in my lungs was screamed out and I struggled to drag any back without choking.  
But...he’s dead. He’s been dead for years. Hasn’t he? Or…

Outside on the pavement for a brief fleeting moment stood a man. Immensely tall, sculpted angular jaw with round dark framed spectacles over deep ocean blue eyes. Flicked jet black rockabilly style hair with matching beard that had tints of salt and pepper running through it. The knee length tattered black jacket with a huge hood that sat only partly on his head. The same broken leather boots. He’d aged in a mild way but I knew it was him but just as soon as he was there he was gone again.  
If I’d seen which direction he’d gone in I’d have got out and chased him down but he seemed to have melted into nothing. Like he was never there at all.  
My brains playing tricks on me. He’s dead. Or was he ever even real?  
I tried to forget it but it was just too hard and far too raw. I felt awful bordering sick. I couldn’t even go home and talk to Spett about it because he’d spent the last 14 years telling me I’d made him up. Some coping mechanism for being alone. I was sure I’d not made him up. Made up his house and the 5 years I spent bonding with him but he disappeared after my mum died and slowly I began to talk about him less and less until he just became a memory. Like her.  
I got out of the van and walked the 20 or so paces to The Royal Oak. Spett could wait. I needed a drink before anything else.


	2. II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In 1984 a discovery is made

II.

At this point I’m going to have to be irritating and take you back to 1984 where there was a brave little girl of around 9 years old who spent a lot of time in the woodland area near her house. She regularly wondered around in search of treasure and adventure. Collecting insects and wild flowers. One who believed that dark and terrible secrets lay in the shadows of the world but still wanted to see and experience everything.  
There was a path just a way off her house known as Mortuum Trail. She’d been told not go too as far as the tree clearing but at the top of the path there was what looked like a huge field and a gigantic deceased tree. Sitting, abandoned looking underneath it was what looked like a tiny one room chapel with a tall tower that stood tangled up in the broken branches of the former tree.  
As she walked forward she noticed the tower housed a rusty bell that clearly hadn’t been rang since the 1800s.  
The strange thing was as it sat alone in the field she noticed the lush floor of the forest she was standing in slowly began to look like it was dying off as she walked toward this strange building. Everything that was green and lush became dishevelled and lifeless. She balanced on the rotten logs and kicked dead leaves until she reached the clearing and as she got closer to the church she noticed that despite the roof being full of holes and the stonework being broken, it was covered top to bottom in English ivy and Morning glory vine that criss-crossed and knitted itself together like a blanket.  
As she reached the door she noted an old rusted tin sign but you could clearly still make out the words like someone had at least attempted maintenance on it. 

Ecclesia S. Albertus Magnus. Latin.  
Usual though it may seem, the girl could read bits of Latin due to the bug and flower collecting.  
‘Church of Saint Albert The Great’ boasted the sign, yet this house of worship had been left to decay like the tree.  
Or so it would seem had the front door not been recently given a thick coat of maroon paint and the huge and well looked after honeysuckle bush that sat right next to the door was another give away. The heavenly scent of pink and white flowers filled her nose. This had to have been put here intentionally.  
She was Alice in her respective Wonderland and this was the Red Queen’s garden. This peculiar looking, yet beautiful building that had to be filled with danger of some sort. She didn’t much care.  
She wondered why her mother and brother never wanted her walking up this end of the trail when there was such unspoilt riches.  
‘I have to get in’ she thought to herself, expecting great difficulty but one push and the door swung open. She expected her fingers to stick and make imprints in the fresh paint but they didn’t thankfully.  
From the inside you could clearly see the visible holes in the roof that the outside ivy covered over. The sun shone through, light scattering across the floor in patches, which was good as ivy had also grown over the one small and cracked stained glass window and there was a thin and torn curtain hung in front of it.  
At the back near the door were a number of broken and moss covered old pews, yet in the centre sat a varnished mahogany alter with foliage growing all over it that sat straight under a patch of missing ceiling so the sunlight draped it in gold, with not like a cross such as you would expect, but a large bronze and well polished statue of Baphomet. The apparent Satanic deity.  
An unmade kingsize bed sat behind that and in the corner was an immense set of shelves filled with so many ancient looking books and scriptures you could physically see the shelves buckling under the weight. Next to that was a brown vintage looking drinks globe filled with what seemed to be mostly vintage whiskey in various shapes of used.  
To the left immediately next to the door was a long and tattered black hooded coat and a big pair of broken looking boots. Yet the 15 year old black Harley Streetglide motorcycle next to them looked pristine. To the right of the door frame was a tall scythe and five shovels of various sizes from spade to snow.  
‘What a bizarre building’ the girl thought to herself as she looked around at all these strange possessions, completely missing the occupant to begin with.  
An incredibly tall and hauntingly captivating looking man stood in the darkness behind the alter, dressed entirely in black but as he stepped forward the first thing she noticed was that he wasn’t wearing shoes or socks.  
His messy dark hair was short at the front with a small looking braided rattail at the back, a stubbled beard and thin round glasses that sat over eyes that you could only describe as the colour of an ocean just after a storm. Iron grey, sky blue, narrow and insanely striking. 

He turned and spotted the small girl with the candyfloss coloured hair stood in his doorway and almost screamed in horror, dropping his whiskey glass which shattered into a thousand pieces. He swallowed the strange sound he had made and tried to compose himself when the girl started to speak. 

“I’m sorry Sir. I didn’t mean scare you. I didn’t realise somebody lived here.” 

He looked struck dumb as he leaned back on the alter, staring intently at the child. He cocked his head to one side in disbelief and wonder before shaking it off and walking up the room muttering to himself looking nervous.  
“What is your name?” came the song bird voice again. 

She could visibly see the man try to regain some sort of composure before speaking.  
“You can see me?” He remarked. His expression was a puzzled but amused look but the eyes looked worried. His neat, arched eyebrows sitting on his slightly lined forehead, peering over his glasses. She noted the eye colour again. She’d never seen it before and it was hugely entrancing. 

He noted her. A small, thin frame of a child. Extraordinary tangled pink hair, wide and curious emerald coloured eyes and pale skin with messy freckles dotted and dashed all over the place. Dressed in dark maroon and black. He was defiantly intrigued but he looked massively uneasy. Unlike her who had eyes filled with admiration. 

“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be able to see you? You are HERE aren’t you?” She beamed at him. He couldn’t really argue with that. 

“Yes, obviously.” His lips curled into a mesmerizing smirk. “Sorry I’m just not used to people… in my house.” The hesitation was interesting but she took little notice. 

“I don’t mean to be rude but WHY do you live here?” He needed to compose himself now, to explain himself. It was early on a Friday morning and he certainly wasn’t expecting to justify himself to a child. 

“I’m...” He hesitated again. “The gravedigger, so I need to live close to the church. Must I be the only one getting the third degree?” He exclaimed suddenly sloping toward her, stopping at the globe to pour himself a replacement whiskey. “What about you? Wondering around on your own. Where is your mother?” He pointed a long, slender finger at her. 

“Work.” The girl looked sad and stared down at her boots. “And my brother. They aren’t really around much at the moment.” She was right. She was too different for school but the hours her mum and brother worked meant she spent a lot of time alone, reading old books or studying aphids, floristry and Latin of all things.  
“Oh. I’m sorry.” The man crouched down to her eye level looking over his glasses again. She got a better look at him. His face was thin with high cheekbones with ghostly pale skin and a thick scar across his thin angular nose. His eyes were such an interesting shade of blue as they seemed to alter depending on the light slightly. He slowly held out a hand. It looked large and strong and was covered in more scars. He cracked a smile and his voice was almost a whisper. 

“Well, pleasure to meet you little one. My name is Magnus De’Eth.”  
“Like the sign outside next to the honeysuckles!” The girl squeaked, about to take the man's hand in her tiny delicate fingers, before he coughed and hesitated, holding his palm up flat. She replicated this, their hands millimetres away from each other but never touching. 

It was very intimate and personal. She assumed it was some kind of secret handshake.

“Yes exactly.” His voice was near a whisper as he watched her eyes, that were still locked onto his fingertips. “Do you like flowers...” He hesitated in a way that meant he would have used her name if he’d known it. She noticed.

“Muriel Morpeth.” the girl looked up at him, a wide smile sitting on her lips.

"Well then little Muriel," Magnus stood with a grin, "Perhaps you'd like to help me see if there are any I can find to bring back and plant with my honeysuckle bush?" 

"What and draw attention away from it? It's beautiful enough on it's own and it's rare." Magnus was dumbstruck.  
"Really?" He smirked, raising an eyebrow. "How interesting. Well, if you don't have anything to do and nor do I, do you have any suggestions?"

"Bug hunting?" She shrugged.   
"Bug hunting." He nodded, pulling on his boots.


	3. III

3

I sat alone at the bar of The Oak trying to make sense of it all. Every Thursday for 5 years I went to see Magnus. I called him Maggie. I read some of his old books, although I didn’t understand the subject matter. He helped me collect butterflies and beetles in some mysterious way and pin them in vintage mahogany frames. He seemed to have some bizarre knack for it. He kept them on the wall above his bed for me. He helped me do small flower arrangements, never touching them for fear of them being spoilt.  
I used to sing and paint. Sometimes we didn’t talk at all, just enjoyed each others company.  
Sometimes we talked all day about all sorts of wondrous things. He let me have a tiny taste of his whiskey when I was 14 to ‘sample the universe.’ It was apparently from the Guild of Barbers and was distilled by order of the King in 1505. He refused to tell me where he got it but I assumed it was expensive or stolen. ‘Every whiskey will seem inferior after this.’  
He was right, as I knocked back my third glass of Bell’s. He was my best friend and helped me see sense of the world.  
I told my mum and Spett about him so many times. I drew pictures of him in his torn jacket and ruined leather boots to be told the church was abandoned. No one lived there, they never had.  
I tried in vain to drag Spett with me on a few occasions and every time he refused. 

I stared into space at the back of the bar, not knowing how much time had passed.  
“Buy you another?” A soft voice came from next to me. I looked to see a bald, skin head man in his late 20s. Green bomber jacket and a thin moustache, narrow lips grinning at me.  
I knew what this was. I looked interesting to people. Some damaged looking girl with pink hair looking for a fix, whatever that might be.  
Men seemed to assume they could fix whatever troubled me with whiskey, hash and sex. I mean it was a welcome distraction for a short time but it never worked. I never kept people around. I had lost two people who meant everything to me so I refused to ever get attached to anyone outside of the ones I had left.

“Go on then.” I gestured. I figured this would kill some more time. I wasn’t ready for the conversation with Spett right now about how Mag wasn’t real. He made me feel like I was insane, so I just made bullshit small talk with whoever this ‘Matt’ was. The old ‘Do you come here often? Where are you from? Your hair is an interesting colour.’ I humoured him but no one could ever get past barriers with me. I didn’t give much away. I just saw distraction from my own head. Anything to block the noise of my mum singing and dancing to Derek and the Domino’s or the sound of Magnus hammering another nail into the stone wall above his bed for the new framed butterfly. 

It had gone completely dark when I pulled the guy into the alley at the side of the pub. Obviously he thought this was immensely sexy, but I just didn’t bring men home. He pinned me on the wall and talked about how crazy this was and breathed down my neck. I could still taste whiskey and cigarettes on my own breath. I’d done this a lot. I just had strings of one night stands. I’d never kissed any of them. The sex was usually quick, public and rough. That was enough for me. No attachment. This poor man was just another on a list. As he came to climax, I closed my eyes and imagined Magnus.  
The glimmer in his iron blue eyes, the audable exhale he made through his nose instead of laughing. The twisted smirk. I remembered his voice from when he shouted my nickname across the church and I heard it so loud, my ears almost rang. 

‘Come here for me Honeysuckle.’ That worked as I threw my head back and my knees buckled. The man put me down from off the wall. I pulled up my tights and underwear as he ajusted himself, as I pulled my key out of my jacket and staggered off to the van. 

“Hey...” He started.  
“Look, I don’t do attachment. It is what it is. Thanks man.” I waved and carried on walking. He seemed stunned but he shook his head and walked off into the night. 

I drove home in about 10 minutes with the windows down, the sound of Trent Razor echoing through the trees and pulled the van up straight outside the door. I heard hushed talking as I wondered my way in, putting my key on the hook and hanging up my jacket, almost knocking the stand over. 

“Where the HELL have you been?” Spett came bounding out of the front room, clearly furious.  
“Lay off me would you? Shit happens.” I tried going past him into the kitchen but he didn’t move.  
“You cannot keep doing this! Have you just driven home drunk?” Spett tried to smell my breath, but I lent back against the wall and lit a cigarette. 

“She wont listen if you shout at her.” Came a soft voice.  
I pushed Spett’s lanky frame out of my way to see his girlfriend laying on the sofa. 

“Alex,” I slurred, “Will you please tell my brother that Magnus is real?”  
“Not this shit again, I’m not...” Spett started.  
“I SAW him in Buxton Spett! Lit-a-rally walking up the pavement.” I took a drag of the cigarette and threw myself into the armchair. 

“Look, you two really need to sort this out. Spett, she’s clearly adamant on this. You really need to start listening, but YOU? Getting drunk, having sex and driving around is not the way to solve this.” Alexandra glared at me. She’d been with my brother for over a year and was a lovely person. She was good for him. I had to admit she was good for me too.  
She was short and sweet with dark hair and rectangular glasses.


End file.
